how does one get a parking ticket on a bike, I could understand if the rider was physically present, but a ticket attached to my bike would end up in the dumpster, I mean do they have license plates for bikes there or something? how do they know who it belongs to?

Sounds like the company was trying to mark a box in a green 'certification' program by installing the rack and encouraging bicycling in other ways, but doesn't actually want people to use a bike, they just want to be able to say they meet whatever green standard they've paid consultants to meet.

I'm pro environment, I've even made a decent living at working in the environmental compliance field, but these green certification programs are mostly a way for consultants to make money, and a way for a company to make themselves look good while not actually accomplishing much.

First - I'm not really convinced that bicycles are greener. I'd argue that the majority of American cyclists are *not* helping the environment nor are they saving any energy. I'm assuming things aren't much different in Canada.

Second - this is a complete non-issue that is being misconstrued and misrepresented to be something it isn't. The lady works for a company and that company is a TENANT in a building. The owner of the building has a limited amount of space.

They have a bicycle rack for couriers. This bicycle rack is highly visible and limited in space.

There you go. She put her bicycle *IN THE WRONG PLACE* - presumably because it is right by the door and free. They have a bikeroom for the office workers. Probably in the garage with all the other cars, if I had to guess.

She is parking in the 'unloading zone' meant for delivery drivers. She isn't supposed to do that. She has another area where she can park.

Everyone is focusing on the text in an e-mail sent by someone who, almost certainly, isn't an official representative of the company. Anyway, the truth is, a lot of bicycles *do* look trashy.... but even ignoring that, there is a limited amount of space. The company I work for has six bicycle racks - and they are all full (largely because half the people here seem to leave their bicycles at work 24/7,,,,I don't understand it). The bicycle rack she choose to use was not the correct one.

Her defense is that there was 'no sign'. The company my company leases their office space from has similar crappy rules that are also not on signs. This isn't a public space, the office workers are tenants and expected to know what is and isn't acceptable - our HR folk handle this. We get e-mails and letters about what is and isn't allowed and most of it is really reasonable. Just like this.

buzzcut73:Sounds like the company was trying to mark a box in a green 'certification' program by installing the rack and encouraging bicycling in other ways, but doesn't actually want people to use a bike, they just want to be able to say they meet whatever green standard they've paid consultants to meet.

Possibly not even any LEED-esque certification. At least in my city, X number of bike rack spaces per load is a requirement for any public building constructed in the last 30 years, just like Y number of parking spaces. Zoning/building code thing. And this is in Kansas... I'd be shocked if Vancouver didn't have such a building code.

This sounds weird, but from the perspective of the developer, the bike rack isn't about people riding to work.

The bike rack represents LEED points toward a silver, or gold, or whatever rating for the building's 'green-ness.'

I'm not sure how a better LEED rating helps the developer, beyond just marketing, but I assume they get a more favourable tax rate or subsidies, or an easier time in the permitting/urban planning process.

IIRC, the point value of a bike rack may be somewhere on the level of using low volatile sealants or something like that.